Top Tech News: Weekly Review

The most important and interesting news on technology, developments, trends and much more.

► National Geographic and Microsoft have become partners in the development of AI for environmental protection

On July 16, 2018, Microsoft and National Geographic announced a partnership agreement to support research on current environmental issues with the help of AI. The fund of AI for Earth Innovation program is estimated at 1 million dollars.

The companies will provide researchers with the necessary financial support, access to Microsoft cloud tools and AI development, include them in the National Geographic Explorer community, and join the national Geographic Labs — NatGeo project to solve world problems using modern data and technologies.

More about terms

Support will be provided for 5 to 15 research projects. As noted by National Geographic, in the standard conditions, the request for a grant should indicate the amount of up to 100 thousand dollars, but some candidates can request up to 200 thousand dollars. Applicants who have achieved some success in their research will be given access to the Earth API for AI, as well as Microsoft Azure applications, tools, and guides.

► Samsung Electronics introduced LPDDR5 memory module

Samsung has completed the development and testing of the new LPDDR5 memory module. The chip uses a 10-nanometer process technology and has a volume of 8 GB. LPDDR5 DRAM is planned to be used in the production of smartphones with support for mobile 5g, onboard car electronics, as well as AI solutions based on mobile platforms.

One of the innovations of LPDDR5 technology is improved energy efficiency. According to the company, the chip consumes 30% less power compared to the previous generation of memory chips of LPDDR4X standard.
The new chip also features an advanced "deep sleep mode" to reduce the power consumption to half of the "standby" level in LPDDR4X memory modules.

The European Commission fined Alphabet $ 5 billion for restricting smartphone manufacturers to pre-install applications and abuse of a dominant position in the mobile OS market. She demanded to review the company's rules for developers and stop limiting them in choosing a pre-installed software package.

Reason for the fine

The Antimonopoly Agency of the European Union has identified a number of violations that the Corporation has illegally committed to strengthening its position among software developers:

the requirement to pre-install Chrome and search from Google for everyone to obtain a license to install the app in Google Play;

payments to operators and manufacturers for promoting Chrome as a default browser;

restriction of smartphone manufacturers with custom versions of Android to use Google applications.

The European Commission concluded that because of such actions, the search giant prevented the emergence of other operating systems and weakened the competitive position of other browsers.

The authority has decided to pay the fine in 90 days, otherwise, the company will be subject to additional penalties of 5% of the average daily turnover of Alphabet holding.

Representatives of the company said they were going to appeal the decision of the European Commission. Google believes that it has misinterpreted the market position and the consumers' wishes: the commissioners exclude Apple as a competitor of the company, considering its OS not available for third-party licensing, and also miss the fact that people choose Android because it offers more options for choice.

► A former NASA engineer built the world's largest water gun

Summer is in full swing, which means a shootout with water guns will be only a joy. Unless that water gun is threatening you, and is a two-meter and shooting stream of fluid with a force of 1 ton per square inch at 600 km / h.
Mark Robert-a former NASA engineer, set a record, making his dream a reality. His seven-foot Super Soaker entered the Guinness book of records — and just look at him.

The gun, made in the form of the classic Super Soaker 50, which was once the brand's first model and popularized water pistols, is much more powerful than its ancestor. It took six months to build the gun.

Robert took advantage of access to alien technology stored in NASA and improved the design. Using compressed nitrogen, the gun accelerates water much faster. Just so you know, the pressure of the water coming out of that gun is eight times higher than the fire hose. So you can grind the bones.

► Google Translate Predicted The End Of The World

Google Artificial Intelligence used in app-translator speaks about the prophecy of the day of judgment when you enter the certain phrase.

This phrase consists of the repeated many times word “dog”. If you ask Google Translate to translate it from Maori to English, the user will receive the following text in response.

Probably, such behavior of the translator is due to a bug in the system of machine learning. The computer got some inadequate information, he learned it and began to use. At least, this is the most logical explanation confirmed by a representative of Google.

It should be noted that the translator reacts in this way not only to the word “dog”. It also responds with phrases similar to biblical, if you enter many times the letters “ag” and ask the program to translate from Somali to English.